


Goes On Trips For the Scenery

by InkandOwl



Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti), IT - Stephen King
Genre: Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Friends to Lovers, M/M, Mutual Pining, Post-Canon Fix-It, Travel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-27
Updated: 2019-12-27
Packaged: 2021-02-26 08:01:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,351
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21989929
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/InkandOwl/pseuds/InkandOwl
Summary: It’s still dark outside and Eddie taps nervously on the back of his phone. Richie answers with a sleepy inhale and says, “I bet it’s the Sonoran that you’re haunting.”His voice is thick and tired and Eddie feels dizzy, “What’s that supposed to mean?”Richie makes a breathy noise that’s probably supposed to be a laugh, “I dreamt about you last night. We were kids again but you were still on the road, and you sent me a post card from every place you stopped in.”“That’s the version of me you knew the most.” Eddie tells him.“No. There’s only one Eddie.” Richie sounds like he’s falling asleep again. “I know you.”—Eddie Kaspbrak died in the house on Neibolt street. But then he didn't, and he is ready to start living.
Relationships: Eddie Kaspbrak/Richie Tozier
Comments: 34
Kudos: 359





	Goes On Trips For the Scenery

Eddie Kaspbrak is dead. 

He was killed on a Tuesday in a freak accident, where a house— a _house_ — collapsed on him in the widely unheard of town of Derry, Maine. He grew up in Derry, at least that’s what Myra was told, and it’s written in the Time New Roman of his obituary.

There’s no body, and the only thing they can send back is a tarnished wedding band that had been abandoned on the nightstand of Eddie’s room in the Derry Townhouse. Myra doesn’t want it anyway, because the last thing she had heard out of her husband’s mouth, two suitcases in hand, was, “I’m not coming back this time. It’s the best thing for both of us.” 

What she doesn’t know, is that Eddie had gone into a collapsing cistern with that wedding band on, fingers wrapped around the resting iron of a fence post, and he had subsequently left with it as well. What _no one_ knows, save for six seemingly random forty year olds, is that Eddie had worked the wedding band off, dropped it onto the puckered wood of the table, bought a burner phone that he tucked into the side of his bags and said, “I think I need to make the most of being dead. I don’t know how else to start over.” 

And maybe that was cowardly. Maybe that was the easy way out. But Eddie had been a corpse on Neibolt street, chest torn open and blood soaking into the dust, and then their past had collapsed into the earth with the devil and so had their scars. He had taken a painful, gasping breath, his lungs and his guts feeling like raw, new skin inside of him and coughed himself awake in Richie’s arms. 

He didn’t go to the hospital, and he didn’t have to fake his own death. It wasn’t a _stipulation_ after he’d basically walked it off and ate half a plate of bacon at the local Waffle House— but it was an opportunity. And Eddie was nothing if not an opportunist. 

Beverly had hugged him tight the next day, Ben leaning against the car waiting for her, “I sort of want to do it your way.” She pulls back just enough to smile up at him, “Just scrub the slate clean and start from the beginning.” 

Eddie pushed her hair behind her ear and grinned, “Yeah, but people would notice if Beverly Marsh, world famous fashion designer, had gone ‘missing, presumed dead’. No one’s gonna think much of Eddie Kaspbrak, risk analyst. Besides—" He looks up at Ben, “Can’t sign a wedding certificate if you don’t exist.” He says it low and laughs when Beverly swats at his chest. 

Completely unmarred. 

“Yeah, well—” Beverly gives him a very pointed look, “Neither can you.” 

Eddie snorts, about to tell her that that doesn’t make any sense, when Richie steps in front of him, fists shoved awkwardly in his pockets. “If you, uh— if you’re ever in LA, give me a call, okay? I know this great burrito place, now that you’re eating real food.” Richie looks into the skyline just over Eddie’s shoulder, squinting behind the lenses of his backup glasses. 

In his entire life, Eddie knows that he will never shake the way Richie looked outside of the Neibolt house. The way he kept his arms wrapped so tightly around Eddie, as if his own body heat and heartbeat would somehow keep Eddie from slipping entirely into death. Like he could stare down reality and tell it, “Shove it up your ass!” as he pleaded with whatever deity would listen to just “Give him back to me, please, I can’t lose him— not again, not like this.” 

If cosmic power and a literal alien space clown’s death wasn’t going to bring him back to life, Eddie was certain that the terrible pain of hearing Richie beg, his tears dropping onto Eddie’s face, probably would’ve done it. He feels sick just thinking about it. About what it all means. “Yeah, Rich, I will.” He could throw a jab at him, tell him something about eating like an adult for once, but he wants to be easy with him right now. Richie deserves it. “You’ll text, right?” 

Richie looks down at the prepaid cricket phone in Eddie’s hand and laughs, “There’s no fucking way that thing gets texts.” 

“It does.” Eddie grins, “You could call too.” 

The fight drains from Richie, his shoulder slumping and he sighs, “Yeah, Eds, I’ll call.” 

Eddie shakes his head at the nickname, “Don’t lie to me, Tozier.” If Eddie were a brave man, the way Richie says he is— If he were a man that went back to New York, carried on with his divorce and moved on like a normal person— he would brush his thumb over the corner of Richie’s mouth, press a kiss there and tell him he’ll see him soon. The way shit stands now though, Eddie is not quite the person he wants to be. Or needs to be. He rests his hand on Richie’s neck instead, the closest he’ll let himself get and he can feel the tendons in Richie’s jaw strain when he grits his teeth. 

Richie might think of himself as a one trick pony, right there with the rest of the world, but that’s not quite right. Richie Tozier is complicated and the look he’s giving Eddie’s is the biggest challenge of all. “Hey, do me a favor?” Eddie furrows his brows when he asks and Richie tilts his head. 

“Yeah, of course.”

“Eat a fucking vegetable when you get home.” Eddie says and Richie laughs, bright and loud, his eyes crinkling up with mirth, “Maybe take some vitamins?” 

“Yeah, yeah, alright, Dr. K.” Richie says through his laughter, wiping away at the threat of tears, “I can cook, you know?” 

Eddie lifts his eyebrows in surprise then, but he smiles when Richie pulls him tight against his chest, “Call me, Rich. Please.”

That’s how Eddie ends up on the road. He’d had a savings account set up in secret from Myra, and before the other Loser’s had declared his death, Eddie had it transferred entirely to Mike’s name. Mike had given him the card and pin to it and Eddie was living on the backroads of life as Mike Hanlon. Sort of. 

The man at the front desk of the motel hands him his card back, “Alright, Mike, no continental breakfast, but there’s coffee in the room.” 

“Thanks.” Eddie offers up a tired smile and drags himself into his room. It’s a tiny roadside motel in Arizona and the air conditioning is running at what can only be described as ‘Arctic Tundra’. His phone vibrates in his pocket and he grins, accepting the call and putting it on speaker. “This place is trying to give me pneumonia.” He says as way of a greeting. 

“You’re in the desert, Spaghetti.” 

Richie’s voice is comically strained on a yawn and Eddie snorts, “Pretty sure it’s set to negative twenty. How was the show?” 

It’s been three months since Derry. Three months and everyone’s set sturdy on their feet. Three months and Eddie’s ready to be sturdy on his feet too. 

Three months of talking to Richie every night. 

They don’t have a name for what this is, but Eddie’s an adult. A lifetime of repression and murder clowns isn’t enough to keep Eddie from looking this thing he feels for Richie in the face and recognizing that this is love. He loves all of the Loser’s but he’s in love with Richie. It fills his days and turns the phantom ache in his chest into something hopeful. It keeps him warm in shitty hotel rooms with overzealous air conditioning units. 

“It was good.” Richie sounds surprised— he always does when he’s faced with people actually _liking_ his jokes. He’s writing his own now, so of course it’s all hilarious. “How’s the Kerouac novel coming along?” 

“Kero—? Oh! Ha ha, because I’m on the road. I get it.” Eddie pulls his shirt off, “God, you’re so fucking cheesy. It’s great, I went to the ‘World’s Biggest Flea Market’ in Taos, and there was a glass blower there that made, get this— clowns.” Richie makes a disgusted noise and Eddie laughs, “I thought about buying one for all of you. Just one for Bev and Ben though, since they’re a unit.”

“A real combo pack, those two. Did you see the picture of them in Bali? I’m disgusted, they’re so hot.” 

Eddie has seen the picture, because despite Richie’s insistence that Eddie’s phone is actually just a Playskool toy, he keeps up with the group chat. He looks down at his duffle bag, a map poking out the side pocket with the word CALIFORNIA printed right across the top. “Yeah, they have no business looking like that at forty. None of you do.” 

Richie makes a strangled noise, “Okay, well you’re not exempt from this, Edward. Not that I remember what you look like since you’re never in any of the pictures you send.” It’s a joke, or an attempt at one, but Eddie can hear the strain in Richie’s voice. There’s still a chance that this might all be projection, but Eddie wants to let himself hope these days. He wants Richie, and maybe in a world where a killer space clown can rearrange his guts, Richie will do the same. Eddie flushes at his own thought and then bursts into hysterical laughter. Richie blusters, “What the fuck happened?” 

“Sorry,” Eddie scrubs the heel of his hand over his eyes, “Fuck, sorry, I just thought of something and it made me laugh.”

“Okay, well fucking tell me, what the hell.” Richie huffs out. 

Eddie shakes his head despite being alone, “No, it’s inappropriate, sorry.” 

“ _Okay_ , well fucking tell me!” He repeats but louder. Eddie undoes his belt, unzipping his bag to find his sweatpants and Richie picks up on the sound over the speaker, “Are you about to jerk off about this? Cause, Eds, I gotta know what it is now that you’re willing to beat your meat with your best friend on the line.” 

“I’m getting changed, calm down. I’ve got an early morning I didn’t want to fall asleep in jeans.” 

Richie makes a sad sound, “Boring. Do you want me to let you go?” 

Eddie pulls on his pants and a white undershirt and collapses back onto the bed with a yawn, “No, no, keep talking, I want to hear about your Netflix deal.” 

He wants to hear Richie talk all the time, something he’d taken for granted in a short lifetime that he got to have it, “Even _I_ don’t want to hear about my Netflix deal.” Richie says, “I’m going to come out during it though. You know— to the world at large.” 

He can see Richie now, feet kicked up on a table and gesturing wildly in front of him and Eddie presses his eyes closed. There’s a sting of tears that he wants to say he doesn’t understand but it would be a lie. Richie’s come out to small crowds. Audiences that aren’t at taped venues and of course it’s vaguely gotten back to the internet, but there’s still people that don’t believe it. Think it’s all just speculation in an attempt to win some favor over to a shitty, hack comedian that espoused sexist, homophobic jokes for the better part of his career. The rumors that Richie’s new stuff is actually ‘really good’ is even more dismissed. Eddie brushes a rogue tear off his cheek, “I’m proud of you, Rich.”

Richie stops rambling for a moment. “Hey, Eds?”

“Yeah?” 

“Is it weird that I miss you?” 

‘No’, Eddie thinks, but he needs to hear it, “What do you mean?” 

“I mean, we talk every day, but I still feel like my best friend just went away to summer camp and I miss you.” There’s a clicking noise on the other end, like Richie’s chewing on something, “I miss seeing your face, I don’t—” There’s a joke there, trying very desperately to lay itself all over Richie’s words, “I don’t want to forget the way you look.” 

Eddie hums, “Still as ugly as you remember.” He promises. 

Richie laughs, entirely humorous, “That’s not how I remember you at all.” 

That night, when they finally hang up, Eddie takes a terrible selfie laying down in his bed and send it over to Richie with the caption, _‘You can hang it up in your locker with little heart stickers._ ’

What he gets back thirty seconds later is; 

_Is that fACIAL HAIR?!_

—

Eddie is just outside of Joshua Tree national park when he calls Bev. 

“Richie says you have a beard.” She says.

Eddie digs his sunglasses out of his backpack and huffs out a laugh, “I don’t have a beard, I have— stubble mostly. I didn’t feel like shaving.” He shrugs to absolutely no one. 

Beverly sounds thoroughly amused when she says, “I know, I’m teasing. Richie sent me the picture, you look very handsome.” Eddie wants to ruminate on Richie sending a picture of him to Bev but she keeps on, “Sort of rugged. Ed, I think you genetically have a bad boy face and none of us realized it.” 

Eddie is trying to rummage in his pocket for coins and manages to drop two quarters on the ground at that, “A bad boy face?!” 

He just wants an iced tea. 

“Yes!” Beverly is eating something, the sound of it rolling between her teeth when she laughs, “It’s very serious and defined, but then you have the soft brown eyes that say ‘I can be saved. Under this crusty exterior I just need love’.” 

“Now I’m crusty?” Eddie feeds his change into the vending machine outside the touristy gift shop. 

Beverly just hums, “You should model for me.” And, ‘What a joke’, Eddie thinks, but Beverly is definitely being serious and that’s uncomfortable. “Where are you at today, oh great traveler of the world?”

“Just North America so far.” Eddie reminds her. He wipes the condensation off the bottle, “Joshua Tree, Mike recommended it to me. It’s beautiful out here, I feel very relaxed.” 

As relaxed as Eddie gets, which these days, is surprisingly adequate. 

The air is dry out here, which is a nice change of pace from the humidity he’d been dredging through along the coast, but it does mean he’s also working through lotion faster than he did as a fifteen year old. “You’re very different now.” Beverly says, but it’s not mean, “You’re staying in hotels, you’re letting your facial hair grow in, you’re eating lord knows what.” 

Eddie sits down of the wooden bench and turns his face up against the wind, grinning, “I had barbeque last night.” It had been amazing and he’d only gotten slight indigestion. 

“See!” Beverly sighs, “You really did die back in Derry, didn’t you?” 

Her voice falters then, and Eddie can’t stand to hear her cry, “And then I came back.” He frowns at his lap, “Why did we let ourselves be so afraid?” 

This is why Eddie likes talking to Bev the most, or— the most right after Richie. They were just two kids with the world trying to bury them. Beverly is crying then, and Eddie can hear her sniffle. It makes his eyes burn, “We didn’t _let_ ourselves be afraid, Eddie, we weren’t given a choice. The odds were stacked against us— what do you do when the biggest monsters are the people meant to protect you? How were we supposed to stand upright when the only love we were given kept knocking us down?”

Eddie blinks harshly at the afternoon sun, “That wasn’t love. What happened to us wasn’t love.” 

“You’re right.” Beverly’s voice is hardly more than a whisper. “We had each other though, and we had the Losers.” 

“You have Ben.” Eddie tilts his head. He’s sure Ben is probably there with her now, watching her with the biggest heart eyes while she talks to him on the phone. 

“And you have Richie.” 

That makes Eddie take a sharp inhale, “Okay, here’s the—”

“Shut up.” Bev snaps, “Shut the fuck up, never mind, you haven’t changed at all.” That makes Eddie laugh despite himself, and Beverly groans, “Eddie Kaspbrak is gone. Disappeared into a sinkhole in _Maine_ , don’t you dare cling to that ignorant—” She’s making wild noises on the other end. 

Eddie bites back a smile, watches a couple park and start unloading all of their hiking gear, “You alright?” 

There’s some general shuffling on the other end, “Eddie, do you love him?” 

He does. He knows he does. But hearing someone else say it makes him dizzy, “Is it obvious?” 

“Not entirely. It’s the only thing that’s made sense about you. Ever since you were twelve.” 

Eddie nods, shifts his phone between ears, “I do. I love him. I’m scared.” 

“You’re going to him aren’t you? That’s why you’re in California?” 

Eddie keeps his teeth gritted, has to swallow a few times and breathe just to get his bearings. Finally he chokes out, “I’m so scared.” 

“I think you’re incredible brave.” Bev says, and there’s a smile on her voice.

—

It’s still dark outside and Eddie taps nervously on the back of his phone. Richie answers with a sleepy inhale and says, “I bet it’s the Sonoran that you’re haunting.” 

His voice is thick and tired and Eddie feels dizzy, “What’s that supposed to mean?” 

Richie makes a breathy noise that’s probably supposed to be a laugh, “I dreamt about you last night. We were kids again but you were still on the road, and you sent me a post card from every place you stopped in.” 

“That’s the version of me you knew the most.” Eddie tells him.

“No. There’s only one Eddie.” Richie sounds like he’s falling asleep again. “I know you.”

Eddie takes a rattling breath between his teeth, and his chest aches, “I left Arizona on Tuesday. Still a wandering ghost.” He says, but that’s not quite right. 

“You can haunt me whenever you want.” Richie says and what it really sounds like is ‘I love you’. Eddie’s heart seizes up and tears spill over his cheeks. 

“33011.” Eddie says, “That’s your condo, right?” He can’t steady his voice for this. 

There’s a beat of silence, then, “Yeah. What are you—?”

“Can you come invite me in?” 

Eddie hangs up the phone and drops it into the pocket of his sweater. It’s not cold outside, but the California morning is pleasant, and Eddie likes the added warmth. The door moves open slowly, like Richie is afraid that fucking clown will be standing there. He’s wearing a holey pair of gym shorts and a faded graphic tee, hair a disaster and glasses shoved onto his face if the red mark up the bridge of his nose is any indication. He looks beautiful. 

“Holy fuck.” Richie voice sounds like it was punched out of him and he takes a beat to shake himself back into reality, “Eds, what the—”

Eddie shoves himself into Richie’s space, wrapping his arms tight around his middle and burying his face in Richie’s shoulder. He smells like clean laundry and warm sleep and like the greatest adventure that Eddie could ever want to take. “Hey, do you have coffee?” Eddie pulls back to look up at his face and Richie laughs, bright and loud. 

“Hang on.” He takes Eddie’s face between his hands, running his thumbs over the light stubble on his cheeks and Eddie thinks that maybe Richie will kiss him. He doesn’t, “Let me get a good look at this stranger.” 

He’s teasing and Eddie keeps his eyes downward, cheeks heating up under the attention, “Still ugly.” Eddie promises. 

Richie grunts, offended and inquisitive, and Eddie looks up at him. Richie grins, “There he is. Oof, you’re knocking the breath out of me, Bambi.” 

Eddie laughs then and shoves him, “Come on, asshole, coffee.” 

They sit on Richie’s porch, on a picnic table that’s covered in potted plants, and fall into a conversation so easy it’s like they never left Derry the first time, or the second time, or each other ever in their lives. “I thought it would be awkward— seeing you in person again.” Richie admits, hands wrapped around his mug. 

“We talked every day.” Eddie reaches out to run his finger over the leaf of a bay plant. 

“I know.” Richie nods down at the table, “I know, and it’s been the only thing that makes sense I just— I worried that when we saw each other that maybe it would be awkward. Like you would remember that it’s me you’re talking to.” 

“My best friend?” Eddie raises and eyebrow, “Are these all yours? You aren’t like, plant sitting for the nice old lady next door or anything?” 

“I’ll have you know that I am something of a green thumb, and I even use these to cook.” Richie leans forward. 

Eddie admires the array of greenery, “And you cook?”

The grin that Richie adopts makes Eddie want to laugh before he’s even opened his mouth, “With the help of my own all natural garden? Yes. These are organic.” Eddie inhales sharply and Richie presses on, “Not a pesticide to be found.” 

Eddie moans, “Richie, please, not in public.”

Richie laughs in delight, “God, Eds, I fucking missed you. Just seeing you, just—” His fingers twitch on the table top and Eddie thinks, ‘ _yeah, I get it_ ’. “Fuck it,” Richie mutters, “When we were kids, I was—” Richie runs his hand over the back of his neck, “I was so in love with you. I told my mom about it, she was understandable freaked out, you know? Not in a bad way, just that it was the eighties and her trouble child was telling her that he was gonna spend the rest of his life with nice little Eddie Kaspbrak from down on Hickory because then we could read comics together whenever we want.” 

Eddie’s skin feels overly sensitive, goosebumps covering his arms and he’s glad for the sweater now. “I wasn’t that nice.” Eddie says, voice quiet and strangled. 

Richie hums in agreement, “No, but to parents you were. Pretty sure Stan and his family were trying to find a way to adopt you back then, just to get you out of that house.” 

“Pretty sure he still is.” Stan is the only Loser that Eddie has seen since It. He had to go to Atlanta, to see his face, and his wife, and the home he’d built. To look him in the eye and say, ‘Me too. I was dead too, I was gone too, but I lived, _we_ lived, so let’s start living.’ He looked great, the scars of their youth fading from his temples. Replaced by greying hair and laugh lines. Patty had watched them talk in severe, rushed voices on their couch and then burst into belligerent laughter. She’s a beautiful, kind faced woman with knowing grey eyes that she had rolled at them and said, “You two were the worst in the group right?” It had prompted both Stan and Eddie to instantly throw Richie under the bus and then Mike and she had held up her slender hand and laughed softly, “No, no, I’m right. You two _acted_ like you were the good kids, but you were the worst.” 

“Richie.” Eddie watches a couple grounds float on top of his coffee. It’s fine, Richie had made him a pour over, he’s not going to complain. “I was in love with you too. My mom made me feel so sick. I felt so dirty all the time, but not with you. Never with you. I wanted you near me all the time, to touch you all the time, and I thought ‘if this kills me— fuck it’.” Richie has gone stalk still and Eddie sniffs once, sipping his coffee. “But I died, so who cares, right?” 

One of Richie’s neighbor’s is playing Anthrax and Eddie is about to comment on it being far to fucking early for that, but Richie tilts his head to the side and says, “Eddie, why did you come here?” 

There’s a litany of words, of excuses and sort of reasons that Eddie could give him. He thinks about Stan, sitting in his living room, rubbing at the phantom itch on his wrists when he tells Eddie, “We can’t be afraid anymore, it’s not what’s meant for us.” He takes a steadying breath, “I was so in love with you, and I still— I’m still in love with you. I thought it might go away, that I didn’t know you anymore, that you weren’t the same kid, but you are. You’re still Richie Tozier and you’re still the only home I’ve ever known.” His ears are ringing, eyes burning with the threat of tears, “You don’t have to feel that way, or do anything about that, I just want you to know. I don’t want to be afraid— not of you.” 

Richie doesn’t speak. He moves his hand across the picnic table and grabs Eddie’s, turning it gently so that he can run the tips of his fingers over Eddie’s palm. Their hands are rough and calloused with age, but their fingers still fit together with the ease and familiarity of childhood. Richie leans over the table, brushes a tear from underneath Eddie’s eye with his thumb and kisses him. It’s gentle and soft, in all the ways they aren’t anymore on the outside, but in the secret, hidden places of them, they are. 

They kiss like this is the only thing they’ve known their entire lives, and Eddie’s hands fit perfectly on the sides of Richie’s neck and into the wild curls of Richie’s dark hair. They kiss and it breaks Eddie wide open in the way that death had tried to and failed. They kiss and Richie pulls back, resting his forehead against Eddie’s and whispering, “Welcome home.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading, this was really just a study in Eddie for me. 
> 
> Come hang out with me on Tumblr! inkandowl


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